


Simplify

by acciss



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Domestic, Fluff, M/M, Original Character - Freeform, Parenthood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-18 05:13:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15478419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acciss/pseuds/acciss
Summary: 'Papa?'‘That’s you.’ Eichi says sleepily, before abruptly turning onto his other side so that his back is facing Keito, dragging a good half of the duvet with him as he does so.‘She has two ‘Papas’, you know.’Eichi and Keito are parents.





	Simplify

Sunday mornings are Eichi’s favourite time of the week. He has come to love being in bed again, now that he’s no longer bound to one. Enjoying an extended morning snooze, he cuddles up to Keito now and again, hazily kissing one another before falling back asleep. He wishes the morning could go on forever.

However, he hears soft footsteps cautiously approaching the door, and he knows that their morning is about to end.

Or at least, Keito’s morning is.

‘Papa?’

Eichi shifts from where he was dozing in Keito’s arms, his head nuzzled into his neck.

‘That’s you.’ He says sleepily, before abruptly turning onto his other side so that his back is facing him, dragging a good half of the duvet with him as he does so.

‘She has two ‘Papas’, you know.’ Keito mutters, sounding grumpy as he tries in vain to retrieve some of the covers back from Eichi’s iron grip on them.

‘Mmmmph.’ Is the only reply Keito gets, and he knows he has lost. Eichi hears him tut and mutter something under his breath as he leaves the bed. Despite being mildly pissed off, he’s still thoughtful enough to shut the door behind him as he goes. Eichi smiles as he hears Keito’s morning greetings.

‘Good morning, sweetheart.’

Eichi doesn’t have to see them to know that this was accompanied by a kiss on the forehead. He hears them pad off to the kitchen, and his smile widens. Eichi wants to get out of bed to join them, but his limbs still feel too heavy, his head too hazy. He knows he just needs another half hour. And so, he falls back asleep, taking full advantage of the empty bed.

‘What do you want for breakfast? I’m making eggs, if you want some.’

‘Can I have some Lucky Charms?’

Keito has to stop himself from wincing as soon as he hears that name. He didn’t even know what those dreaded things were until Eichi came home with three boxes of them last week. Keito is immediately reminded of why he hates letting Eichi go grocery shopping unsupervised. The last thing he wants to do is feed his daughter what is essentially a bowl full of sugar and milk. He steels himself and tries his best to be stern, ready to tell her no.

But when he looks down, Maya is staring up at him excitedly, and he knows that that is not about to happen.

‘I...Alright. But you can’t have them every morning, okay? Just on the weekends.’

She smiles and nods, climbs onto her chair at the table, and waits patiently for her food.

_She’s nothing like Eichi._ Keito thinks to himself. _She’s so much more gentle, more patient. If I’d said the same to Eichi at that age, he would have thrown such a tantrum._

As he prepares their food, he wonders if Eichi would have been more like their daughter when he was a child, had he been raised by a family that loved him, and not by a bevy of nurses and nannies who were too afraid to say no to him. He feels a little melancholy at the thought.

As if on cue, Eichi strolls in in his Egyptian cotton pyjamas, his hair still tousled from sleep. _Honestly_ , Keito supposes, _Eichi must be the only grown man on the planet who still sleeps in full pyjama sets._

‘Dad!’ Maya exclaims excitedly, and Eichi envelops her in a hug.

‘Good morning, you two.’

Keito ignores him, still mildly annoyed at him for denying him a Sunday morning lie-in. Eichi senses this immediately, and makes a beeline for the kitchen.

‘Gooood moooorning...’ he sing-songs, standing behind Keito so that he can speak _right_ into his ear. He gets no response.

‘Smells good.’ Eichi remarks to Keito, before being distracted by the colourful box of cereal sitting on the counter. ‘Oooh. I’ll have these instead.’

‘I really wish you hadn’t bought three boxes of those.. _.things._ ’ Keito sighs, continuing to make his eggs, feeling a slight twinge of shame when he realizes he’ll be the only one in the family eating something remotely healthy this morning.

‘But they’re yummy.’ Eichi smiles. ‘And they’re from America!’

‘You know, sometimes it feels like I’m a single father to two children. And one of them is seriously overgrown.’

‘Does it really bother you?’ Eichi’s smile fades, and he looks at him with concern. Keito is completely taken aback by his sudden shift in tone.

‘N-no! No...I…’He says as soon as the words leave Eichi’s mouth, worried that his more-than-slightly affronted grumpy behaviour has genuinely upset him.

‘Fufu. Then stop complaining.’ His facial expression immediately brightens again.

Keito sighs, and Eichi presses a kiss to his jaw. Eichi is even better than Keito at feigning emotion.

Once the three of them finish eating, Keito heads to the kitchen to tidy up. He is, however, stopped in his tracks by a little girl.

‘Papa?’

‘Yes?’

‘Could you show me how to draw a pony?’

_Fuck._ Keito thinks. _I have so much work to catch up on today._ But she’s staring at him so earnestly with those pale blue eyes, and Keito knows there’s no way he can say no.

He briefly wonders if he’d have an easier time being a stricter parent if their daughter looked less like Eichi.

He scoops her up in his arms and brushes her wispy blonde bangs from her eyes, which earns him a giggle.

‘Of course I can. Go get dad to help you get dressed, okay? And brush your teeth as well. Then we can draw some ponies.’

He places her back down and she nods sternly before marching off to find Eichi. Whatever Maya  does, she does it seriously. _She didn’t inherit that from Eichi, anyway._

The pair of them emerge fifteen minutes later, looking as lovely as ever. Keito feels a twinge in his heart at the sight of Maya, in her peter-pan collar dress, clutching onto Eichi’s hand.

‘You two have fun.’ Eichi says, before making his way to the sitting room and curling up with a book. Keito makes a mental note to ask him what he’s reading later. He leads her into his study and sits her on his lap.

‘I’ll draw one slowly first, okay? So you can watch how I do it.’

She nods eagerly, clutching his pencil in her left hand. Keito can’t help but smile at how she furrows her brow in concentration as her eyes keenly follow every one of Keito’s strokes.

‘Do you think you want to try now?’ He coos, brushing her hair back behind her shoulders so that it doesn’t get in her way.

‘Yes.’ She’s confident, as always. Keito’s not sure which parent she picked that up from.

‘Okay, I’ll watch you. Tell me if you need help.’

They sit like that for hours, drawing and redrawing, Keito offering gentle critiques to her, and Maya taking them fully on board. She’s so earnest and hardworking that Keito can’t help but thank his lucky stars. Eventually, they produce a picture that she’s happy with, a rather realistic drawing of her own pony that Eichi keeps at the local stables for her.

‘What do you want to do with it?’ Keito asks her.

‘Nothing. I just wanted to know how to do it.’

Keito can’t help but laugh at that. She already sounds much older than her age. He supposes it might be inevitable.

‘Can I keep it, then?’

She nods affirmatively, slides out of his lap, and leaves the room. Clearly she has bigger fish to fry. Keito smiles again and pins the drawing on the wall facing his desk.

 

\--

It’s later now. Maya is sleeping soundly, and Keito has just finished up the last of his work. He walks down the hallway, trying his very hardest not to make a sound, and joins Eichi in their bedroom. He’s curled up, in his expensive pyjamas, nose in a book. It’s a frequent sight, but something about Eichi looks even more warm and inviting than usual. Keito wastes no time in getting undressed and slipping into the bed beside him, quite happy to just soak up the warmth of Eichi’s body that has begun to heat up their bedsheets.

 Eichi smiles at him, sets down his book, and cuddles up to Keito.

‘You’re a good papa, you know.’ Eichi says, snuggling against Keito’s shoulder. Keito shifts to hold him in his arms, and Eichi instead decides to nestle his head in the crook of Keito’s neck. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too. So much.’ He says as he strokes Eichi’s hair. It took them a long time to get to this point, but somehow Eichi always knew it would happen. He knew he would have to have at least one child; being the only Tenshouin heir kind of made that inevitable. But when it came to actually thinking about the technicalities of it, everything seemed hazy and foreign. It was a concept he tried to push out of his mind, for a while; there was a point in his life when the very last thought he wanted to entertain was that of domesticity and kids. But he always had a niggling feeling that if Keito was with him, then it might be bearable.

Eichi thinks that thought is partially responsible for him having pushed Keito away for so long, too. He spent most of his twenties running away from anything that felt like a commitment; how could someone who wasn’t sure if they would live past thirty commit to anything, anyone? The potential for pain was so great that he couldn’t even bear the thought of it for the longest time. But he got older, his health improved, and so did his mindset. Now he’s curled up in bed with the person he’s loved for almost his entire life, and he feels like things have fallen into place.

He can’t quite shake that little bit of guilt, though.

‘I feel bad for making you wait so long, you know. For me. For this.’

Keito says nothing for a while, just shifts so that Eichi can nuzzle himself right into the nape of Keito’s neck. He knows it’s his favourite spot- Keito’s scent is the most relaxing thing on earth, and it’s at its strongest in that spot. Eichi presses a few tender kisses to his neck before burying himself completely in there.

‘Don’t feel bad. I would have waited forever.’

Eichi groans. ‘That doesn’t make me feel any better.’

Keito lets out a soft laugh, and Eichi feels the vibrations from where his hand is resting on Keito’s chest. His heart flutters a little bit. _Why_ did _I wait so long?_

‘Maybe I should rephrase that. Yes, it took a long time, but I wouldn’t have changed anything.’

 ‘You should have just said that in the first place…’ Eichi mumbles, but Keito can feel that his mouth is upturned into a smile from where he’s lying against his neck.

'Sometimes I like to remind you of how cruel you are.” Keito smirks. Eichi never thought he'd be in the position where _Keito_ was teasing _him_.

'Oh, fuck off.’ Eichi laughs, and shoves his shoulder for emphasis.

'You’re uncouth...You can dish it, but you can't take it, right?’

'I can do both. You just need to watch what you say to your precious husband. Your actions could have consequences.’

Keito decides to humour him, stroking his hair as he speaks.

'What kind of consequences?’

'Who knows? It could be anything. You could wake up one morning and find that every single food item in the cupboard has been replaced by a deluxe sized box of Lucky Charms.’ Eichi’s voice is soft, muffled as he speaks into Keito’s shoulder. Keito has come to love that light, affectionate tone he uses when they talk like this.

'I honestly wouldn't put it past you. In fact, I'd almost expect that of you. I've endured you for most of my life at this point, you know? You need to be more creative if you want to keep me on my toes.’

'Are you trying to encourage me?’

'No, just an observation. Maybe you're getting old.’

'That’s probably due to your influence, seeing as you were an old man from the moment you left the womb. If anything, you should feel guilty for crushing my youthful spirit.’

Keito just laughs. It’s late: he knows he and Eichi could keep this up for hours, but there comes a point where enough is enough. He lifts Eichi’s chin so that he can give him a proper kiss, and slips his arm out from underneath him before it goes numb.

‘Okay. Sorry for crushing your youthful spirit. Goodnight.’

He turns out the lights, and turns to lie with his back facing Eichi. Less than thirty seconds pass before he feels Eichi’s thin arms wrap across his chest. He pulls himself closer to Keito, pressing his forehead against his shoulder. He gives him a long squeeze, an almost childlike gesture of affection. Sometimes words even fail Eichi. In those rare circumstances, he figures a hug will suffice.

‘Sweet dreams.’

  



End file.
